The Center for Women’s Leadership Initiatives (WLI) develops and manages dynamic, innovative and substantive programs to cultivate and support women as leaders and change makers around the world.

Women Enhancing Technology (WeTech) is a CGI Commitment to Action to help women and girls enter and succeed in technology careers. WeTech trains women and girls, builds networks and offer professional opportunities across Africa, India and the United States, developing the skills needed to fuel technological and economic growth. IIE has brought together a powerful array of corporate program partners and continues to expand the consortium.

IIE’s Higher Education Readiness HER program provides young women in secondary school from underserved communities with a path to university. A three-year pilot project in Ethiopia, HER provides 100 girls entering the 11th grade with scholarship support combined with innovative leadership and life skills training to help them complete their secondary education and equip them with the tools needed to continue on to university.

TechWomen empowers, connects and supports the next generation of women leaders in STEM in Africa, Central Asia and the Middle East by providing access and opportunity to pursue their dreams and inspire women and girls in their communities. Through mentorship and exchange, TechWomen strengthens participants' professional capacity, increases mutual understanding and expands girls' interest in STEM careers by connecting them to female role models.

WES equips women entrepreneurs in Tunisia with the leadership and practical skills needed to actively participate as innovative leaders in their communities. WES provides training, coaching and seed funding to partner organizations as they learn to operate WES Centers using a social enterprise model which supports entrepreneurialism and sustainability.

ACE-Leaders supports four organizations in Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda and Ethiopia to develop centers of excellence in women’s advocacy and leadership training in Sub-Saharan Africa. ACE-Leaders provide a space for sharing experiences and networking to mobilize women for change.

Past Programs

E-Mediat: Tools, Technology and Training, with funding and support from the U.S. Department of State’s Middle East Partnership Initiative, Microsoft, Craigslist Charitable Fund and Cisco, provide 250 NGOs with new media skills and resources to help advance their missions and expand their support to local communities.

The WIT program empowers women and expands their participation in the workforce by providing local NGOs, and the women they serve, with cutting-edge training in business planning, professional development, information technology and entrepreneurship. IIE partnered with the State Department, Microsoft and Cisco Systems, to train over 11,000 women in nine countries. Since U.S. government funding ended, thousands of women have graduated owing to the sustainability model at the core of the WIT program.

EWLP creates champions of women’s health, education and economic empowerment through leadership development. The nine-month program is integrated into several Ethiopian universities, and enables young women to strengthen their educational outcomes and emerge as the next generation of women leaders. University administrators, gender officers and academic staff are key partners in EWLP, as they learn to strengthen the systems of support for women students.